As noted, I am working on a Chaos project for the new, 8th Edition of Warhammer 40K. Nonetheless, there is still stuff from my current (and still main) 40K army on my table, including these lovely Wulfen I managed to finish. Weiterlesen →

A new edition of Warhammer 40K is as good an excuse as any to start a new army. Since I have a variety of Chaos miniatures, some of which I used to play Shadow War Armageddon, my current idea is to (maybe) finally try making them into a small army. Weiterlesen →

I listened in on Games Workshop’s live Q&A on the new edition of Warhammer 40K. Here are my notes, in case you’re interested.

Rule Changes

Rules from the Warhammer Community Preview Article are still in.

Armour Values for Vehicles are gone. Vehicles use a stat line like other models.

Vehicles will become less effective and “lose” abilities/stats similar to how big monsters in Warhammer Age of Sigmar become less effective as they take wounds.

Each vehicle will be affected differently and in a unique manner.

Monsters will work very similar to vehicles (and vice versa).

The new Edition still uses D6.

An average game of, say, around (currently) 1500 points will last about 90 minutes on average (about half of what it takes now).

New version is designed with 3-ways-to-play in mind with strong support for narrative play planned.

There will be two sets of point values for units/models.

One called „power level“ for narrative play. Very „rough“, not taking into account individual equipment, etc.., but allowing „rough“ balance.

For „Matched Play“, point values go into all the granular details of individual weapons, etc.

Key words are used to define abilities (i.e. a Space Marine Captain may buff units with the „Adeptus Astartes“ keyword, but not, say, Imperial Guard).

Command Points & Army Organisation

Command Points are a new mechanism to make the game more tactical and better reflect army selection (narrative & matched play).

Narrative and matched play requires armies to be “battleforged” (organised long detachment rules).

Compliance with detachment rules will give an army command points.

Lots of detachments/force organisations will be available.

One command point per phase.

Command points can be used, for example, to re-roll dice, interrupt actions of an opponent during an opponent’s turn, etc.

“Generic” Command points will be in the general rules and army specific command points will be featured in future Codexes to reflect the flavor of different armies Codexes as a product will still exist (including command point rules).

Rules & Codexes

On launch there will be 5 books: Space Marines, Forces of the Imperium, Xenos, ??, ?? to cover all armies at launch (cheaper than Codexes). These include points.

Expansions such as Planetstrike and Cities of Death will reappear eventually (as well as new narrative supplements).

free core rules will be available digitally. GW stores and stockists will have a limited supply of printed free rules.

A Warhammer 40K app with army builder is being worked on, but will not be available on launch.

No currently existing factions and models will disappear (no „Bretonnians“).

Matched Play and Tournaments

Matched Play section will be updated annually (along the lines of Age of Sigmar General’s Handbook), including adjustment of point values.

New Edition was playtested by external playtesters (e.g. Frontline Gaming, etc..) as well as internal playtesters.

There are no specific tournament rules over and beyond „Matched Play Rules“ (but guidelines/recommendations to help tournament/event organisers).

Story & Other Things

New faction(s) coming, including at least one at launch.

A design goal to position Chaos more fully as the main antagonist.

White Scars still exist (despite being absent from the new map).

Codex Refund

If you bought a Warhammer 40K Codex or rulebook within 8 weeks of last Saturday’s announcement of the new edition, you can contact Games Workshop customer service for a voucher.

It’s been a while since I played X-Wing and, frankly, I lost track of recent releases.

But with an opportunity to play a few games over the coming weeks, I bought the first shiny new ship that caught my attention – a Rebel TIE Fighter! – and will get a chance to fly it soon. Weiterlesen →

The main attraction of Shadow War Armageddon box, at least visually, is clearly the terrain. I started by picking out the two sprues from the box that make the terrain piece GW calls, individually packaged, the Ferratonic Furnace. Weiterlesen →

Look at what the mailman brought. A shiny new box of Shadow War Armageddon!

It has been a while since I played with my Warhammer 40K miniatures, but Games Workshop latest skirmish tease has me back in a flash, ordering a box of Shadow War Armageddon (which also sold out in a flash, so I’m clearly not the only one). Weiterlesen →

As I move house, my paints and miniatures disappeared in boxes. Deprived of „proper“ hobby time, I took to playing on my iPhone. Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion is a really cool retro game with shiny modern graphics

Playing Deathwatch feels a lot like playing Space Hulk or Imperial Assault (if set in Games Workshop’s grimy 40k-universe, not Star Wars).

What is Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion?

Deathwatch plays as a turn-based strategy game. You command a „kill team“ of 5 Space Marine to battle hordes of the insect-like Tyranids.

You select one of your Deathwatch Space Marines and order him to move, shoot, attack in close combat or use one of many special abilities (like setting a Space Marine, Space-Hulk-style, on overwatch) with a limited number of action points.

After that, it is the Tyranid’s turn. And more than once I found myself nervously fidgeting, hoping a Space Marine of mine would make it to my next turn alive.

As I said, very retro. And a lot of fun.

Choosing & Equipping the Space Marines

A big part of why Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion is great fun is the ability to train, personalise and equip the various Space Marines serving in your kill team.

A newly recruited Blood Angels

At first glance, Space Marines would appear to be fairly uniform. It is also worth mentioning that the game (currently?) only comes with Space Marines from three chapters, the Ultramarines, the Blood Angels and Space Wolves and in four variants: Tactical Marines, Assault Marines, Devastators and Apothecaries.

A veteran of many bloody battles!

Though this might seem limited, the game more than makes up for this in the various skill-trees, equipment options and variants it offers within this selection.

Surprisingly, the developers truly managed to bring „personality“ to the Space Marines. Playing the game, I really became attached to my band of grimdark heroes.

Rodeo Games even added a bit of banter between the Space Marines of different chapters, which sometimes plays during a mission. A cool touch!

Accomplish Different Missions!

Take down that Carnifex!

Rodeo Games also added variety to the game by giving you different missions: Break through and reach a base, secure vital information, defend a position for a number of rounds or take down a particularly tough opponents like a Carnifex or Hive Tyrant.

Give Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion a try!

Does Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion replace the tangible gameplay of a board game with miniatures? No, not for me. Probably not for you, if you are coming from the miniature-games side of the hobby as well.

But if you’re plastic soldiers are packed away, as mine currently are, Deathwatch: Tyranid Invasion is a great game to scratch that particular itch.

It truly plays like a miniatures board game on a touch screen and very different from most smart phone games. And it really makes you work hard to achieve those missions (on Veteran and Heroic difficulty) with some nail-biting challenges.

The Weapon of a Jedi: A Luke Skywalker Adventure offers well-written and well-illustrated, fast-pace action scenes of X-Wing dogfights and lightsaber duels, strung together by a minimal story of, essentially, The Force telling Luke to go from A to B.

It is a good fast-food-read of Star Wars nostalgia and a bit of X-Wing and lightsaber-action, but nothing truly memorable stands out. No unique story is told.

A Journey to Star Wars: The Force Awakens

Disney acquired Star Wars and cleared out four decades of books, comics, games and other background material known as the Extended Universe. A few classics regrettably went down with it, but having a clean slate still seems like a good idea.

The novel series „A Journey to Stars Wars: The Force Awakens“ is part of the new Disney lore, leading up to the Star Wars: The Force Awakens later this year.

That said, The Weapon of a Jedi, this particular book in the series tells a story set between the original Star Wars movie and The Empire Strikes Back. It holds no secrets, hints or spoilers for things happening after The Return of the Jedi.

The book itself has 184 pages, uses a large font and features several double-page illustrations throughout. It is a premium format with a short story, not a true novel.

The Story of „The Weapon of a Jedi“

The story follows Luke, before as a Rebel pilot – before he ever met Yoda, before he knew the identity of his father – along with C3P0 and R2D2.

The book kicks off with a bit of X-Wing vs. TIE-Fighter action, which I thought was great fun. Ultimately, Luke feels The Force nudging him to visit a backwater planet, and on the backwater planet an ancient temple quarantined by the Empire.

Once Luke finds the temple, he receives a bit of pre-Yoda Jedi-training and must immediately test his new skills, especially with his lightsaber.

The Good

There is a lot to like about this book. This book is clearly meant as a quick, fun read, and it delivers in that.

The writing flows well, the action is exciting and the C3P0 vs. R2D2 banter adds old school Star Wars comic relief. Likewise, the production of the book is great. The grey pages, the added artwork Disney veteran Phil Noto fits and the general visual design make this a very nice book to hold and read.

Thus, before I start nitpicking, I would recommend Jason Fry’s The Weapon of a Jedi to anyone looking for a fun, light Star Wars-read for an afternoon or two.

The Bad

There are a few things that keep the book for being truly excellent.

The story, in any sense of the word, is nonexistent. The Force tells Luke to go to this place or that. Luke, after some hesitating, follows and the next action scene occurs. A bit more plotting would have added a great deal.

The whole idea of Luke receiving separate Jedi-training, distinct and before he meets with Yoda, for me, does not sit that comfortably with the original trilogy of movies. If scrapping the old Extended Universe meant to clear out inconsistencies, it seems odd to bring them back in from the get-go.

It is a brief tale. 184 pages sounds like more than you get, given the large font, plenty of artwork and more. The book is beautifully produced, but with a regular font and less white-space, this story would only fill 40-50 pages. There is an element of making it appear more than it truly is.

Conclusion

I had fun reading the The Weapon of the Jedi and would usually recommend it for Star Wars fans looking for a light read.

The book probably holds little interest for a broader audience, as it really tells no distinct story of its own. There is no room to lose oneself in a fantastic universe or become engrossed with the twists and turns of a thrilling story.

This isn’t what The Weapon of a Jedi aims to do.

This is a book for a quick, fun lightsaber-battle and some nostalgic Star Wars quotes to read about on the subway, which it nails pretty well.

To Hit Hard, To Survive the End Game

There is a nice symmetry in the list, with two X-Wing aces at 38 points and two Bandits, who generally serve to purpose of being a nuisance to my opponent.

Though the two X-Wing aces cost me the same amount of points, they fly very differently on the table.

Wedge Antilles is not nearly as survivable as Poe Dameron. He rarely survived the games.

He did deal massive amounts of damage and I was really, really positively surprised with the BB-8 + Push the Limit combination. I knew it was good. I didn’t know how good. It makes the X-Wing extremely maneouverable (for an X-Wing) and allowed Wedge Antilles to deliver his trademark killer-attacks right where he needed them to be. With or without Wedge Antilles, this is a combination I will certainly use again (with a T-70 X-WingRed Squadron Veteran or even Poe Dameron himself).

Poe Dameron in this build was the exact opposite to Wedge Antilles, as far as X-Wing-builds go. With Autothrusters, re-rolls from Lone Wolf and the ability to regenerate shields, he was meant (and usually was) built for the end game, the last ship on the table, where he excelled at wars of attrition.

Again, I am happy to report that Poe Dameron served excellently in this faction.

In one game, circling with an equally mobile and nearly as robust IG-88 Aggressor, I was able to wear my opponent down through many, many turns of shooting and shield-regenerating.

It wasn’t the finest game of X-Wing ever played, but it shows Poe Dameron’s potential for the long game, assuming he does not die early in the game to a concentrated barrage.

Final Thoughts?

Did I win the tournament?

No. I was beaten soundly by a Scum-&-Villainy-Swarm full off M3-A Interceptors and only just managed to eke out a small, technical victory by points against a Squadron of Y-Wings with Twin Laser Turrets and Corran Horn in an E-Wing.

That said, both X-Wing were tons of fun to fly. They were also effective in their own right and complemented each other well.

A fun list, and I will definitely fly something along those lines again!